WikiLeaks founder’s removal from London embassy brings seven-year diplomatic stalemate to an end

Julian Assange is facing extradition to the United States and up to five years in prison after he was forcibly dragged from the Ecuadorian embassy in London on Thursday, bringing an extraordinary seven-year diplomatic stalemate to an end.

Assange, an Australian citizen, will receive consular assistance on Friday but won’t be given any “special treatment”, the country’s prime minister, Scott Morrison, said. The country’s foreign affairs minister, Marise Payne, said officials had been advised that Britain would not agree to extradition if an individual would face the death penalty. “Australia is completely opposed to the death penalty and that is a bipartisan position,” she said. “The matter for the extradition itself is one between the United States and the United Kingdom.”

After 2,487 days in the embassy, the 47-year-old was arrested after Ecuador revoked his political asylum and invited Metropolitan police officers inside their Knightsbridge premises, where he has stayed since 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden over sexual assault allegations which Assange has always denied.

Later on Thursday, he was found guilty of failing to surrender to the court and faces up to 12 months in a British prison.

BBC Newsnight

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Julian Assange’s lawyer, Jennifer Robinson, says his arrest today is “a free speech issue” because it “is all about the ways in which journalists can communicate with their sources”#newsnight | @suigenerisjen

At a central London police station, Assange was further arrested at the request of the US seeking his extradition over allegations he conspired with former US military analyst Chelsea Manning to download classified databases in what the US justice department called “one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of the United States”.

The arrest provoked a fierce debate over Assange’s future and possible extradition. While the government defended the arrest over breaching bail as evidence that “no-one is above the law”, Labour and civil liberties groups condemned the US extradition request.

In the US, Donald Trump said “I know nothing about WikiLeaks,” adding, “it’s not my thing.” In the final month of the 2016 election, Trump mentioned WikiLeaks 164 times. His opponent in that election, Hillary Clinton, said the WikiLeaks founder needs to “answer for what he has done”

Jeremy Corbyn tweeted “the extradition of Julian Assange to the US for exposing evidence of atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan should be opposed by the British government.”

Freedom of speech advocates including US whistleblower Edward Snowden said that an extradition over the leaks constituted a risk to press freedom. Meanwhile, as others argued that the US charges should be considered separately to the Swedish allegations, prosecutors in Stockholm said that his arrest was “news to us”.

The US accuses Assange of “conspiracy to commit computer intrusion”, alleging that he assisted Manning in cracking a password to help her infiltrate Pentagon computers and download material to share with WikiLeaks. If convicted, Assange faces a maximum sentence of five years .

Dramatic footage showed him handcuffed, heavily bearded and with his hair tied back, gesticulating and shouting “UK must resist” as plainclothes officers carried him from the embassy shortly after 10am to a waiting police van. He was clutching what appeared to be a copy of Gore Vidal’s History of the National Security State.

One Assange supporter, who witnessed the arrest, said: “There were at least six men dragging Julian out and more uniformed police standing by. Julian was talking but he was bundled into a van. He looked dazed.”

Assange in a police van after he was arrested by British police. Photograph: Henry Nicholls/Reuters.

Westminster magistrates court heard that when police arrived inside the embassy, Assange barged past them in an attempt to return to his private room. He had to be restrained after resisting arrest and claiming “this is unlawful”.

Judge Michael Snow was highly scathing of Assange, saying “His behaviour is that of a narcissist who cannot get beyond his own selfish interests.”

Outside court, Robinson said they had warned since 2010 that Assange would face extradition to the US. “Unfortunately, today we have been proved right.” She said Assange thanked his supporters, and had said: “I told you so.”

Assange was initially arrested for failing to surrender to the court after losing an appeal against extradition to Sweden, where he faced two separate 2010 sexual assault allegations.

Elisabeth Massi Fritz, lawyer for one of the two women accusers, said they would seek to get the Swedish police investigation re-opened “so that Assange can be extradited to Sweden and prosecuted for rape”. One of the women told the Guardian she would be “very surprised and sad” if Assange was extradited to the US. “For me this was never about anything else than his misconduct against me and other women,” she said.

Theresa May told MPs that she welcomed the arrest: “This goes to show that in the United Kingdom, no one is above the law.” Downing Street said the prime minister and the government were aware in advance that Ecuador intended to revoke Assange’s asylum status. A No 10 spokeswoman said while there had been “a dialogue with the Ecuadorian government from the start” the decision to revoke asylum “was one for them entirely”.

Explaining the decision, Ecuador’s president, Lenín Moreno, said: “In a sovereign decision Ecuador withdrew the asylum status to Julian Assange after his repeated violations to international conventions and daily-life protocols.” He accused Assange of interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, and added: ‘The patience of Ecuador has reached its limit.”

Q&A

Why was Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy?

The Ecuadorian ambassador to the UK, Jaime Marchan, said: “He was continually a problem to us, he was very disrespectful to the authorities, he has said that we were spying on him, he has said we were lying, we were agents of the United States.”

However, there was condemnation of the arrest from many quarters. Amnesty International UK said that if Sweden pursues extradition over sexual assault allegations, then assurances should be made over not sending Assange to the US. “There is a very real risk that he could face human rights violations” due to his work with WikiLeaks, a spokesperson said.

Ecuador’s former president, Rafael Correa, accused his successor of being the “greatest traitor in Ecuadorian and Latin American history”.

Snowden, the former US government contractor wanted for leaking details of US surveillance programmes, called the arrest a “dark moment for press freedom”. Meanwhile, actor Pamela Anderson, one of a diverse range of public figures and celebrities to have visited Assange, tweeted that she was “in shock”, and accused the UK of being “America’s bitch” and of seeking a diversion “from your idiotic Brexit bullshit”.

Manning downloaded four databases from US departments and agencies between January and May 2010, the indictment said, with the information provided to WikiLeaks. Some selected and edited material from WikiLeaks was published by the Guardian, the New York Times, Le Monde, El País and Der Speigel.

Assange’s arrest came one day after WikiLeaks accused the Ecuadorian government of an “extensive spying operation” against him, during which, it claimed, meeting with lawyers and a doctor inside the embassy over the past year were secretly filmed. Assange supporters reported increased police activity at the embassy last weekend.

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NOVANEWS

Journalists claim to have uncovered the “massive use” of French-made weapons in war-torn Yemen through a leak of secret military documents.

Radio France and investigative reporters from the NGO Disclose say they have obtained a classified 2018 report about French arms sold to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, both of which form part of the Saudi-led coalition fighting Houthi militiamen in Yemen since 2015.

The paper was allegedly compiled last September by France’s military agency DRM and handed over to President Emmanuel Macron and other cabinet-level officials. It apparently contains a list of all French weapons deployed in Yemen by the two Arab monarchies.

The journalists went on to claim that some of the French-made weapons are being used in combat operations in Yemen, including in civilian zones. Specifically, two French-made warships — a missile-launching corvette and a warfare frigate — are said to be taking part in the naval blockade of Yemen, as per the report.

The leaked report appears to include a map titled “Population under threat of bombs”, which indicates the deployment of 48 CAESAR guns near the Saudi-Yemeni border.

“Put more simply, the guns are used to bombard Yemeni territory to open up a path for the tanks and armoured vehicles invading the country,” the journalists argue. The population living within the range of potential artillery fire is estimated at being over 436,000.

According to the report, at least 129 CAESAR howitzers are due to be delivered to Saudi Arabia between by 2023.

French authorities are yet to comment on the matter.

French Minister of Armed Forces Florence Parly said in a radio interview in February that the military had “recently sold no weapons that can be used in the Yemeni conflict”.

Last October, she rejected claims that domestically made weapons were targeting civilian population. “To my knowledge, the weapons we have sold recently have not been used against civilians,” she told reporters.

The minister also described France’s weapons exports to Saudis as “relatively modest”, saying they were subject to tight restrictions. “We don’t sell weapons like they’re baguettes,” she added.

Disclose and Radio France note, meanwhile, that the French parliament has been “deliberately kept apart” from this information by the government, which has so far given only “fragmentary answers or even falsehoods”.

Posted in USA, France, Saudi Arabia, YemenComments Off on French-Made Weapons Reportedly Used in Yemen War, More Arms to Be Delivered